


Ahead of the Game

by MizJoely



Series: Sherlolly AU Prompts [17]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: F/M, Roman Empire AU, Sherlolly - Freeform, mcd is not one of them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-07
Updated: 2015-12-07
Packaged: 2018-05-05 09:22:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5370101
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MizJoely/pseuds/MizJoely
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>thesecitystreets on tumblr said: Eeee! Holy cow I didn’t realize there were so many AU’s … it was tough to pick one, but this particular AU stood out for me: “i jokingly told you that the only way i’d marry you was if you did this weird outlandish thing, and you actually did it, and i’m kind of charmed.”  Hehe! Can’t wait to see what you come up with!!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ahead of the Game

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sherlockian_87](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sherlockian_87/gifts).



> OK, so I had a bit of a struggle for this one until the other day when a light finally went off and I thought: Roman Empire era AU and then the ‘weird outlandish thing’ became screamingly obvious and I hope you like it. Also apologies for the really bad pun title which will become even more screamingly obvious once you read the whole story, which is rated M for blood and gore and (of course) sex.
> 
> I didn’t really try very hard with the names since this is basically a PWP. But Sherlock’s second name? Totally a real Roman name!

“As you requested, my lady.”

He thumped the canvas sack down on the table hard enough to rattle the ceramic plates and cups sat on the further end. Molly stared, unable to tear her eyes away from the object the Roman Centurion had just gifted her with – and it _was_ a gift, of that there was no doubt. Not only a gift, but exactly what she’d demanded of him, half in exasperated jest, when last they’d met a fortnight ago.

_You want me to marry you, Roman? Fine. Bring me the head of Seamus Moriarty. He's my enemy but he's yours too, even if you don't know it yet._

Stunned brown eyes met cool blue-green as she took in the fact that Sherlock Homerus, decorated Roman Centurion and brother to the powerful Roman governor of Britannia, had actually gone to so much trouble just to get her to agree to marry him. They’d met when he’d been wounded in a skirmish outside the city walls; he’d been incredulous that a Brittonic healer would bother saving the life of a Roman soldier, and she’d coolly told him that the Gods valued all lives equally. He’d scoffed at her beliefs, but had allowed her to tend to his numerous wounds. Over the span of six months he’d sought her out and engaged her in many absorbing – and oft-times exasperating – conversations, culminating in a completely unexpected marriage proposal. Well, it had been more of an arrogant demand, but the end result was the same: for some unfathomable reason, he claimed to want to marry her.

“Why?” she asked as she moved closer to the table on which the gruesome bundle had been dropped, ignoring the blood seeping through the coarse canvas to soak the rough-grained wood below.

Because she had to know. Had to know that he’d truly done this for _her_ , and not as part of some political maneuverings, to aid his brother Mycroft, or for some kind of military advantage – not that she could imagine such a thing, but she’d been used once and refused to allow it to happen to her again.

She had no inflated sense of her value: she wasn’t a war chieftess like the revered (by Britons) Salonina Donatus, or an influential political figure like the Greek courtesan Eirene Adellus. She was just the daughter of a hooper, an ordinary girl who’d had the misfortune to catch the eye of a Celtic weapon’s dealer, to whom her dying father had betrothed her against her protests.

A man whom she discovered was cold-bloodedly supplying both the Romans and the local Brittonic rebels with weaponry – and who she quickly discovered only wanted her to give himself a veneer of respectability as well as ties to the local clans in order to cement his position in their territory.

Sherlock’s reasons for wanting her were impossible for her to figure out, if only because the man was an enigma: scholar and warrior, coldly aloof one minute and burning with white-hot intensity the next. A seeker after justice who wouldn’t allow the smallest incident to rest no matter who the victim or who the culprit, be they Briton or Roman, and yet a dutiful son of Rome who showed no mercy to her people when in the heat of battle.

“Why?” she asked him again when he made no answer, simply stared down at her as he stood at his full, most imperious height in front of her, the bronze of his armor gleaming dully in the candlelight of her modest home. “Why do this for me? Why do you want to marry me? Why _me_? I don’t count…”

He finally moved at that last word, reaching out to pull her close to his body. With one hand he yanked his helmet off, dropping it with a clatter so that it rested next to the bloody sack with its gruesome burden. A burden that, far from horrifying or disgusting her, only raised a fierce joy in her heart. The man who sought to use her and caused so much sorrow had instead met a well-deserved fate at Sherlock’s hands. “Never say that, Molly,” her would-be husband growled as she turned her face up to meet his. “You’ve always counted and I’ve always trusted you.” Then his lips crashed down to meet hers, and her doubts were temporarily silenced.

Her hands scrabbled at the clasps to his breast-plate as he deepened the kiss, sliding his tongue between her lips in manner that should have horrified and disgusted her, but instead only further aroused her ardor. She felt his fingers undoing the ties to her simple gown, and soon she stood before him utterly naked, feeling simultaneously shy and powerful at the look of pure adoration in his eyes. “Let down your hair,” he commanded, and she reached up to undo the pins one by one while he finished removing his armor and tunic.

His hair was cut short, in the normal Roman fashion, and although it still seemed strange to her eyes to see a man with no beard, no braids or shaggy locks hanging about his shoulders, she found it suited him well. More than suited him; the slight curl at the back of his neck as he bent to undo the laces of his sandals was mesmerizing and she longed to feel it beneath her fingers. Sherlock looked up just then; their eyes met, and she gasped as she saw the dark centers expand so that the blue-green irises were nearly obliterated. He lunged for her, pulling her to his lean form, toppling them both to the coarse bearskins covering the cold stone flagons of the floor, her father’s one luxury.

She was still a maid, but she’d seen naked men before, in the course of her work as a healer. Never before had she felt one pressed so tightly to her body. The heat of his manhood against her belly was a burning brand, and she felt a corresponding flash of moisture between her legs as he continued to kiss her. His hands were tangled in her waist-length tresses, and her fingers were running over his cropped black locks, damp with sweat but raising a tingle that began in her fingertips and spread throughout her entire body.

He raised himself over her as the kiss ended, and she found the breath and brain to ask him, one last time, “Are you truly doing this for me? You want me just for me and not what I can do for you? You give your word?”

“Molly, in the morning I am dragging you before the priest or priestess of your choice and making you my wife,” Sherlock growled as he thrust one leg between hers. “It is against my brother’s express wishes and I doubt your clan would approve either. So no, I am not doing this to cement an alliance or gain some sort of advantage. I am doing this because I need…” He paused to kiss her again.

“What do you need?” she asked breathlessly when the kiss ended.

“ _You_ ,” he said, a world of emotion packed into that one simple word.

She opened her legs to him, moaning as he laid kiss after kiss down the column of her throat. Those plush lips were soon suckling at her breasts while his hands slipped beneath her body and kneaded the soft flesh of her rear. Gladly did she surrender every inch of herself to his questing tongue and soft lips, rejoicing in the pleasure he brought with every kiss and every caress. His fingers slid over her thighs and brushed against the damp curls between her legs; with a moan she felt them slip into her entrance, pressing against her heated flesh until she thought she would combust.

He pulled his fingers away, but only to ease his manhood within her welcoming folds. There was a slight burn as he breeched her maidenhead, but it swiftly faded as he moved within her. Clumsily she sought to match his rhythm, but clumsiness vanished at the sound of a deep groan rising from his throat. “By the Gods, Molly, you have no idea how I’ve longed for this moment, when I could finally make you mine. You have to marry me now, else be forever branded a fallen woman. Say you will, say you’ll marry me.” He gave a sharp thrust of his hips and she cried out as pleasure flared through her body, setting her aflame and darkening her vision.

“Yes,” she gasped when the power of speech was finally restored to her. “Yes, I’ll marry you Sherlock Homerus.”

He gave a strangled shout and she felt his seed pulsing into her body, stared unabashedly at the intent expression on his face – eyes clenched so tightly shut, lips pulled back in a near-snarl, those ravishing cheekbones shining with sweat and glistening in the firelight.

Many years later, when their children asked what their father had given their mother as a wedding-gift, she would only smile and nod at the eldest, their son Gaius Virgilius, who would roll his eyes and go back to whatever scroll he’d been studying.

The head in the bag, that was long since sunk to the bottom of a peat bog, would remain her and Sherlock’s secret. Seamus Moriarty had chosen the wrong players to align himself against in the dangerous game of life.


End file.
